Journalist and political analyst, Mohamed Mustafa Elias, tells Sky News Arabia that Sudan is a pivotal country due to its geographical location, which borders countries that are already experiencing unrest and have a “fragile situation”.
He says the clashes have caused a large wave of displacement, and that as a result of the conflict, tens of thousands of people have fled, including Sudanese and citizens of neighboring countries, led by Chad and South Sudan , despite the state of instability and the difficult living conditions in these countries.
Demographic and migration studies expert Ayman Zuhri agrees with him, who points out that Sudan has taken in refugees from neighboring countries and has become a source for them after the conflict.
According to Zuhri’s statement to “Sky News Arabia”, the directions of those fleeing depended on the “geographical location” in which they live inside Sudan. Those living in the west headed for Chad and central Africa, those who lived in the north headed for Chad and central Africa. in Egypt, and those who lived in the south headed for South Sudan.
There are fragile countries neighboring Sudan that were not “ready” to receive the displaced and those fleeing military operations, led by Chad, the Central African Republic and South Sudan, according to Sky News Arabia.
Sudan is one of the largest Arab and African countries in terms of area. It is bordered to the west by Chad and the Central African Republic, to the north by Egypt and Libya, to the east by Ethiopia and Eritrea, and to the south by South Sudan, Kenya, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo and the Republic of Congo.
Five of Sudan’s neighboring countries, namely Ethiopia, Chad, Central African Republic, Libya and South Sudan, have experienced political turmoil or conflict in recent years.
The impact of human displacement
More than 30,000 people have fled to Chad, South Sudan, Ethiopia and central Africa, according to UN estimates, which have warned the number fleeing could reach 270,000 if fighting continues. continue. Zuhri believes that the escalation of the situation inside Sudan will cause an unprecedented wave of refugees to three countries, namely “Chad, Central Africa and South Sudan”. It indicates that these flows will negatively affect the economic and social conditions of “Chad, Central Africa and South Sudan”, given that they do not have the capacity to absorb the large number of refugees and their ensure a minimum standard of decent living. These “fragile” countries suffer from serious economic and political problems, and therefore the impact of humanitarian asylum on these countries will be “very negative”, according to an expert in migration studies.
Chad
Elias says Chad is the country most affected by the Sudanese conflict, due to ongoing clashes in the town of El Geneina, Darfur, near the Chadian border. About 20,000 other Sudanese refugees have fled the Darfur region into Chad since the fighting began, according to the United Nations, but Elias believes the numbers are much higher in the absence of “official statistics”. UNHCR in Chad plans to host 100,000 refugees from Sudan, according to the worst estimate. The displacement is an additional burden on the scarce resources of Chad, which was already under pressure due to hosting 400,000 refugees who fled a previous conflict in Sudan, says Zuhri. He says Chad has a large number of refugees from many other neighboring countries, so the exodus will add “economic pressure on this poor country”.
Zuhri supports his statement with the following figures:
Chad has about 16 million inhabitants, according to World Bank statistics for 2019. In 2018, about 42% of the population lived below the poverty line, according to the World Bank. It ranks third among the least developed countries in the world. It has one of the highest maternal mortality rates. One in five children dies before their fifth birthday, according to the World Bank. Chad is home to more than a million people in a state of “forced displacement”, including more than 580,000 refugees who have fled conflicts in neighboring countries. Chad faces military challenges on all its borders, and in the west of the country the army has been fighting the “Boko Haram” group linked to the “ISIS” organization since 2015.
southern sudan
Elias reveals the number of people displaced to South Sudan, and says he has passed the threshold of 200,000 displaced people, most of whom are Sudanese who live in the belt separating the two neighbours.
UN estimates suggest the return of 125,000 South Sudanese citizens who previously sought refuge in the northern neighbor, and the UN High Commissioner for Refugees plans to smuggle around 45,000 new Sudanese refugees into Sudan. from South.
Zuhri confirms that these large figures will cause more problems in South Sudan, which depends on international aid, referring to some statistics in this regard:
75% of South Sudan’s population will need humanitarian assistance in 2021. According to World Bank estimates for 2018, 80% of its 11 million people live below the poverty line. Two-thirds of the population of South Sudan suffer from severe hunger.
central Africa
According to Elias, the number of displaced people who have crossed into Central Africa is “few” given that “the borders between the two countries are closed”.
There are no precise figures on the number of people displaced to Central Africa, but it already suffers from several serious economic, political and military problems, according to Zuhri.
He reviews several figures in this regard:
Central Africa is ranked 188th out of 189 countries in the United Nations Development Program’s Human Development Index for the year 2019. Around 71% of the country’s population of 4.9 million people live below the poverty line. Central Africa is suffering from armed clashes that have killed thousands and driven nearly a quarter of the country’s population into exile.
Accordingly, Zuhri calls for the intervention of the African Union Commission to resolve the conflict inside Sudan and invites the warring parties to sit down at the negotiating table, given the “catastrophic” repercussions of the conflict on fragile neighboring countries in particular.
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